A method for early detection and identification of fungal contamination of building materials using e-nose

PLoS One. 2019 Apr 9;14(4):e0215179. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0215179. eCollection 2019.

Abstract

The aim of the study was to develop a method for early detection and identification of fungal contamination of building materials using an electronic nose. Therefore, the laboratory experiments based on the analysis of the air in the vicinity of fungal isolates potentially found in the building materials were performed. The results revealed that the employed gas sensors array consisting of MOS-type sensors enables the detection of the differences among the examined samples of fungi and distinguishing between the non-contaminated and contaminated samples, shortly after fungal contamination occurs. Electronic nose readouts were analysed using Principal Component Analysis and the results were verified with standard chromatographic analysis by means of SPME-GC/MS method, which proved that gas sensors array can be applied for early detection of fungal contamination.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Air Microbiology
  • Air Pollution, Indoor / analysis
  • Construction Materials / microbiology*
  • Electronic Nose* / statistics & numerical data
  • Environmental Microbiology*
  • Fungi / chemistry
  • Fungi / isolation & purification*
  • Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry
  • Humans
  • Principal Component Analysis
  • Semiconductors
  • Sick Building Syndrome / microbiology
  • Solid Phase Microextraction

Grants and funding

The infrastructure built with European Union funds – The Eastern Poland Development Programme 2007–2013 – Regional Laboratory of Renewable Energy, Institute of Agrophysics of Polish Academy of Science were utilized in this study. Research was also partially supported by Ministry of Science and Higher Education in Poland within the statutory research of the particular units.